A publicly-funded university, University of British Columbia, Canada boasts three former prime ministers of Canada, incumbent PM Justin Trudeau, 71 Rhodes scholars, 256 Royal Society of Canada members and 65 Olympic Games medal winners among its alumni Spread across two campuses — Vancouver and Okanagan Valley — in Canada, the University of British Columbia, Canada (UBC, estb. 1915) is consistently ranked among the world’s Top 50 institutions of higher education. The London-based Times Higher Education (THE) ranks UBC #37 in its latest World University Rankings 2019, while in the Academic Ranking of World Universities of the Shanghai Jio Tong University, it’s ranked #43. A publicly-funded university, UBC (annual budget: $2.6 billion or Rs.13,579 crore) boasts a host of impressive alumni. Among them three former prime ministers of Canada, incumbent PM Justin Trudeau, 71 Rhodes scholars, 256 Royal Society of Canada members and 65 Olympic Games medal winners. UBC’s eight faculties provide a wide range of undergraduate and postgrad programmes to its 65,012 students, including 16,188 international scholars from 156 countries, mentored by 16,089 faculty. The university’s departments of life sciences (#26), clinical, pre-clinical and health (30), social sciences (29) and business and economics (25) are ranked among the Top 30 worldwide by THE/ QS. Also a respected beehive of research and development, UBC (annual R&D budget: $658 million) has signed 1,109 agreements with government and non-profit organisations, and 1,375 research projects are being implemented with industry partners and 207 companies. Vancouver. The most populous city (2 million) of British Columbia, Canada’s western province, Vancouver is widely admired as one of the world’s most scenic port cities and consistently ranked among the Top 5 cities worldwide for livability and quality of life. Also ranked #17 in the league table of the world’s best student cities by QS rankings 2019, Vancouver hosts art galleries, theatres, a wide array of restaurants and sporting hubs (the city hosted the 2010 Winter Olympics and 2010 Winter Paralympics). Vancouver has a moderate, oceanic climate. Protected by mountains and warmed by Pacific ocean currents, it’s one of the warmest cities in Canada with temperatures in summer averaging 22°-14° C and 14°-8° C in winter. Vancouver also has a reputation for rain — it’s the 9th rainiest urban habitation of Canada. Campus facilities. A half-hour bus ride from downtown, UBC’s 400-hectare Vancouver campus is surrounded by dense forest on three sides and ocean on the fourth. This century-old campus, which has experienced a $1.5 billion (Rs.10,329 crore) infrastructure upgrade in recent years, hosts state-of-art facilities for academic, sports and co-curricular education. Campus landmarks include Triumf, a world-renowned laboratory for subatomic physics; Museum of Anthropology, the country’s largest teaching museum; the Chan Centre for Performing Arts; Beaty Biodiversity Museum, which houses Canada’s largest blue whale skeleton; a world-class UBC Botanical Garden; Centre for Plant Research and Centre for Interactive Research in Sustainability. The Vancouver campus hosts 44,000 undergraduate and 10,000 postgraduate students. UBC’s Okanagan campus inaugurated in 2005, is purpose-built for the 21st century and also provides its 9,120…
